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This is a typical argument from 'neutral principles'.In this kind of thinking, the notion of 'being fair to everyone in a principled fashion that is easily and

This is a typical argument from 'neutral principles'.In this kind of thinking, the notion of 'being fair to everyone in a principled fashion that is easily and mechanistically describable' is more important than say, the notion of 'not oppressing women, even if the Saudis think it's OK'. This is itself a value judgement and comes down to your opinion. Like the old joke about turtles, it's opinions all the way down. It's also fairly obviously absurd; there are countries where public opinion and even the legal system are pretty much OK with rounding up gays and beating them up, or worse. You have to have a pretty hefty commitment to neutral principles to think that Apple and Google should be OK with the "Let's Beat Up a Batty Boy" app because it's OK in some country...

avip 8y ago
You did not address anything OP raised. Maybe read this https://www.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-criticism/ https://www.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-criticism/ (it's short, concise and relevant) and try to articulate your stance here - who should have the authority to take these subjective moral decisions? [edit: sorry it's not short at all, but self-repeating so just read a few and you're done]
- glangdale 8y ago
  I reread everything from OP, and everything from my post, and think I addressed it well enough. Both OP and many of the critics of Cloudflare are casting around, like the philosophical equivalent of a dog with a bucket on its head, hoping that the uninteresting question of "is there some magic neutral principle that will allow us to operate from day to day without making subjective moral decisions" (narrator: "there isn't") will be conveniently resolved with some appeal to local law, free speech absolutism, slippery slope fallacies, catchy Latin slogans, etc. My stance here is that everyone has to make these subjective moral decisions all the time and that the hope that we can pull a neutral principle out of our ass and Resolve Everything is itself a moral decision and not exempt from moral criticism. It's just yet another value judgement: specifically in the Cloudflare case, it's that "the abstract neutral principle of free speech and the idea that companies shouldn't interfere with who they host" is more important than "maybe we shouldn't let those assholes from the Daily Stormer go about their business with impunity". I'm OK with you believing that if you want to, but it's just as much of a subjective moral decision to prioritize a quest for neutral principle over making your own ad hoc moral decisions (which you will wind up doing anyhow). In short, it's subjectivity all the way down, so you may as well 'fight your corner'.
  - avip 8y ago
    The narrative CloudFlares' CEO used is: >"is it the right place for tech companies to be regulating the Internet... what I know is not the right answer is that a cabal of ten tech executives with names like Matthew, Mark, Jack, ... Jeff are the ones choosing what content goes online and what content doesn't go online." I'm not sure the dog-in-a-bucket analogy holds. He has a moral stance, but he's not sure he should be exercising it.
    - glangdale 8y ago
      Philosophically, he is a dog-in-a-bucket. Either be moral or don't; you don't get extra credit for agonizing a bit on the decision and suggesting that somewhere there might be some really good solution ("maybe there will be a broad multi-constituency committee of wise people who can decide for all of us who gets to be on the internet"?). I'm sure as a businessman he knows exactly what he's doing. Some Pilate-level hand-washing ("I don't want to make this judgement, you know") is just good business - you can blunt some of the criticism from the Free Speech Absolutists ("Hey guys, I'm uncomfortable too!") while also saying farewell to your least favorite customer, the Daily Stormer. Putting the criticism up is also pretty astute in this regard.
nogenerix 8y ago
I'm trying to understand the 'neutral principles' line of thinking here. Obviously, the situation with this app seems straightforward on the surface (the app is immoral, it violates human rights), but articulating the reality of the situation is complex and requires nuance. Say I don't want to argue from 'neutral principles' but I still want to give other people's value systems a fair trial? Then I would consider things like the intentions and outcomes, right? Maybe there's a good reason that women in Saudi Arabia have legal guardians?
- sneak 8y ago
  > Maybe there's a good reason that women in Saudi Arabia have legal guardians? I urge you to rethink your comment.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- glangdale 8y ago
  > .. but I still want to give other people's value systems a fair trial? Why? That's a moral judgement like any other ("we should exercise fairness and take seriously any system of values that operates within a recognized national boundary circa 2019"). It would suggest you are committed to that principle above other ones, like "the right of women to self-determination". If that's a decision you want to make, knock yourself out, but it leads to rather strange situations. Note that I made it sound extra absurd by limiting in time and to national boundaries; but conversely I could take off that limit and have you giving Aztec human sacrifice fair consideration ("strokes beard... well, actually, given population pressures... ummmn... "). You're still flailing around looking for neutral principles: considering "intentions and outcomes" doesn't get you out of trouble as who is to say what intentions and outcomes are good? A homophobe in Uganda or Russia might claim that their intentions are "save our young people from the gays" and their desired outcomes are "now all the gays are dead or hiding" as a Good Thing; they would not recognize your principles ("don't harm innocent people for no reason") as valid. In the end it just comes down to 'fighting your corner'. There is no magical conjuration trick that will make our values objectively better in some way that stands outside our values. Who cares?

avip 8y ago

You did not address anything OP raised. Maybe read this https://www.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-criticism/ https://www.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-criticism/ (it's short, concise and relevant) and try to articulate your stance here - who should have the authority to take these subjective moral decisions? [edit: sorry it's not short at all, but self-repeating so just read a few and you're done]

glangdale 8y ago
I reread everything from OP, and everything from my post, and think I addressed it well enough. Both OP and many of the critics of Cloudflare are casting around, like the philosophical equivalent of a dog with a bucket on its head, hoping that the uninteresting question of "is there some magic neutral principle that will allow us to operate from day to day without making subjective moral decisions" (narrator: "there isn't") will be conveniently resolved with some appeal to local law, free speech absolutism, slippery slope fallacies, catchy Latin slogans, etc. My stance here is that everyone has to make these subjective moral decisions all the time and that the hope that we can pull a neutral principle out of our ass and Resolve Everything is itself a moral decision and not exempt from moral criticism. It's just yet another value judgement: specifically in the Cloudflare case, it's that "the abstract neutral principle of free speech and the idea that companies shouldn't interfere with who they host" is more important than "maybe we shouldn't let those assholes from the Daily Stormer go about their business with impunity". I'm OK with you believing that if you want to, but it's just as much of a subjective moral decision to prioritize a quest for neutral principle over making your own ad hoc moral decisions (which you will wind up doing anyhow). In short, it's subjectivity all the way down, so you may as well 'fight your corner'.
- avip 8y ago
  The narrative CloudFlares' CEO used is: >"is it the right place for tech companies to be regulating the Internet... what I know is not the right answer is that a cabal of ten tech executives with names like Matthew, Mark, Jack, ... Jeff are the ones choosing what content goes online and what content doesn't go online." I'm not sure the dog-in-a-bucket analogy holds. He has a moral stance, but he's not sure he should be exercising it.
  - glangdale 8y ago
    Philosophically, he is a dog-in-a-bucket. Either be moral or don't; you don't get extra credit for agonizing a bit on the decision and suggesting that somewhere there might be some really good solution ("maybe there will be a broad multi-constituency committee of wise people who can decide for all of us who gets to be on the internet"?). I'm sure as a businessman he knows exactly what he's doing. Some Pilate-level hand-washing ("I don't want to make this judgement, you know") is just good business - you can blunt some of the criticism from the Free Speech Absolutists ("Hey guys, I'm uncomfortable too!") while also saying farewell to your least favorite customer, the Daily Stormer. Putting the criticism up is also pretty astute in this regard.

nogenerix 8y ago

I'm trying to understand the 'neutral principles' line of thinking here. Obviously, the situation with this app seems straightforward on the surface (the app is immoral, it violates human rights), but articulating the reality of the situation is complex and requires nuance. Say I don't want to argue from 'neutral principles' but I still want to give other people's value systems a fair trial? Then I would consider things like the intentions and outcomes, right? Maybe there's a good reason that women in Saudi Arabia have legal guardians?

sneak 8y ago
> Maybe there's a good reason that women in Saudi Arabia have legal guardians? I urge you to rethink your comment.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
glangdale 8y ago
> .. but I still want to give other people's value systems a fair trial? Why? That's a moral judgement like any other ("we should exercise fairness and take seriously any system of values that operates within a recognized national boundary circa 2019"). It would suggest you are committed to that principle above other ones, like "the right of women to self-determination". If that's a decision you want to make, knock yourself out, but it leads to rather strange situations. Note that I made it sound extra absurd by limiting in time and to national boundaries; but conversely I could take off that limit and have you giving Aztec human sacrifice fair consideration ("strokes beard... well, actually, given population pressures... ummmn... "). You're still flailing around looking for neutral principles: considering "intentions and outcomes" doesn't get you out of trouble as who is to say what intentions and outcomes are good? A homophobe in Uganda or Russia might claim that their intentions are "save our young people from the gays" and their desired outcomes are "now all the gays are dead or hiding" as a Good Thing; they would not recognize your principles ("don't harm innocent people for no reason") as valid. In the end it just comes down to 'fighting your corner'. There is no magical conjuration trick that will make our values objectively better in some way that stands outside our values. Who cares?